Rotary honors tulip grower Leo Roozen

The La Conner Rotary Club, noted for its steadfast support of literacy and education, will honor at its annual dinner and auction this Saturday someone whose family is often lauded in print for its remarkable success growing tulips in the Skagit Valley.

Leo Roozen, whose father, the late Bill Roozen, was a La Conner Rotarian, will be the local club's honored guest at its major Aug. 24 fundraiser here.

Billed as "The Magic of Rotary," it is 5:30-9 p.m. at Maple Hall.

The Roozen family began growing tulips in Holland before America became a nation. Over the past 75 years, it has become an integral part of the global flower industry while based in Skagit Valley, reputed as one of the best places in the world to produce tulips. Our temperate climate and latitude are similer to the Netherlands.

Money raised at the auction helps support the club's many service projects, missions that range from its signature literacy and education initiatives to promotion of daily food security and the funding of scholarship awards.

Known as the "make it happen club," its members take pride in adhering to Rotary International's Four-Way Test while having fun in the process.

By all accounts last year's dinner and auction was a fun night, which honored four-term La Conner mayor Ramon Hayes, as Rotarians raised around $90,000 – including winning bids and pledges from diners – on behalf of the causes they champion.

Roozen is being saluted for embodying his family's time-honored creed celebrating hard work and a "job well done" approach. He is universally praised for having embraced technological innovations in the industry, including computer-controlled bulb rotation systems enabling year-round production.

Roozen will be recognized as a Paul Harris Fellow, with the club making a $1,000 contribution to the national Rotary Foundation in Roozen's name.

"Leo is our club conduit to the tulips we sell to locals and visitors alike in two local booths," club President Audrey Gravley told the Weekly News. "We make weekly deliveries to La Conner businesses and visit other Rotary clubs from Seattle to Bellingham throughout the month of April each year."

Washington Bulb Company, which Bill Roozen purchased in 1955, includes a retail division, RoozenGaarde, which opened in 1985 on 3 acres just over 6 miles northeast of La Conner.

"Without Washington Bulb and this very popular product," said Gravley, "our average net sales of $12,000 to $20,000 wouldn't be available to us. Without Leo and his family business, we wouldn't be able to share with so many local charities and programs."

In its last fiscal year Gravley said the club funded 51 local organizations or projects and 14 regional and international needs.

"Many of our (club) members," she said, "also individually support projects as well."

In the current year, which began July 1, funds are raised for the following year.

"That means that proceeds from the auction and from our tulip sales in April 2025 will be used beginning in July 2025," said Gravley.

About 60% of the funds generated cover local needs. Just under 20 per cent is committed to district and international Rotary projects. Only five per cent is budgeted to cover administrative costs, Gravley said.

"This leaves about 18 per cent of our funding to respond to grant requests," Gravley said, "(which are) mostly local in scope and need."

For the current year, Gravley said La Conner Rotary has budgeted $29,000 for La Conner High School scholarships, the club's largest single project.

"We also support a number of programs in the La Conner School District, along with many other organizations, such as the local food bank, library programs, poetry in the schools, third grade student dictionaries and a book per month from birth to age five for local children through the Dolly Parton Imagination Library," said Gravley.

Those community outreach programs benefit significantly from the club's collaboration with Leo Roozen, Washington Bulb Co. and the Roozen family.

"I think it's very appropriate to highlight the contributions the Roozen family has made to our community over the years," Gravley said. "They're certainly an agricultural powerhouse.